Frederick Thomas

Fred is a genuine Hoosier, born and raised in Richmond, Indiana. He earned degrees from Michigan State, Purdue and Indiana University. He taught secondary school science and math in Vermont and Ghana, and taught preservice teachers at Riverina CAE in Australia and Miami University in Ohio. He finally settled in to teach physics and astronomy for over 2 decades at Sinclair Community College in Dayton, Ohio (just a few miles over the border from his childhood Indiana home). At Sinclair, he was deeply involved in efforts to achieve better integration of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. He was one of the co-PIs for the first round of NSF grants under their Advanced Technological Education program—the program which popularized the idea of STEM.

After retiring from Sinclair, he served as President of the non-profit, 501(c)(3) organization, Learning with Math Machines, Inc. He remains active in in-service teacher education and curriculum development. His most recent publication (co-authored with Robert Chaney and Richard Tseng) is The Physics of Destructive Earthquakes, published by IOP Concise Physics and Morgan & Claypool.